


Rebuttal

by ewinfic



Series: Remote [6]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Gen, M/M, Retcon, Soulmates, Telepathy
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-12
Updated: 2015-11-30
Packaged: 2018-05-01 05:43:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 18,947
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5194358
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ewinfic/pseuds/ewinfic
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sixth part of the Remote series, where Steve and Bucky are telepathic soulmates: When the group took down Hydra, they forgot someone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I've been planning to write this for a while but it simply refused to be written until now. Tying up loose ends from the first retcon.

_"So who broke the encryption?"_

_"Hill had some friends work on it for me. I actually tried to give the drive to you when I was shot, but it's just as well; I'm not sure you and Natasha could have cracked it on your own."_

_"Was it Pierce who created the algorithm?"_

_"Not a chance. He was a smart man, but he wasn't any kind of programmer, and the logic behind it would have taken years to work out. Someone else came up with this, and I suspect that we haven't yet found who that someone else is."_

_"Well, we'll find him eventually. Whoever he is, he's running out of places to hide."_

* * *

Steve was surprised by how quickly the new arrangement became routine. True, Sam was not Bucky. He didn't have nearly the same ability with a rifle, nor could he melt into his surroundings in the uncanny way Bucky had developed during his years as an assassin. But he made up for it in other ways. For one thing, his eyesight was equally sharp, and the sensors in his goggles made him even sharper. For another thing, he provided aerial support, which Steve hadn't even realized they needed.

But perhaps the transition was merely eased by the new intimacy Steve felt with Bucky. They were linked even more firmly than before, almost to the point where their edges blurred and they occasionally had thoughts that neither one of them could strictly claim as his own. Steve felt Bucky by his side during all of his missions. Steve felt as though he were truly with Bucky during his harrowing disclosure sessions with Fury. And they had a promise from Fury: these two things never happened at exactly the same time. Fury always knew the clock a mission was on, so it wasn't difficult for him to schedule Bucky's sessions around the times that Steve was in the midst of the action, and Fury needed to be on-call during those times anyway.

The recitals were difficult for Bucky, as Steve had expected. But something about the night Steve had shared with the Soldier had altered something in Bucky. It was as though a distinct part of him, that part which had lived in death for so long, had finally found a home inside of his mind where it could integrate with the rest of him. The Soldier was no longer a distinct entity. It was a type of Bucky, and as long as that was true Steve and Bucky both could tolerate him. Now that the Soldier had a place of his own of sorts, Bucky could use him to help with the process of remembering. Bucky Barnes couldn't talk about things like that with any kind of composure. But Bucky the Winter Soldier could discuss anything with absolute calm and lack of feeling. Fury seemed to appreciate the difference. At any rate, he was remarkably (in Steve's estimation) patient with Bucky's process as they sorted through the massive history of homicidal wreckage.

The Soldier was now a regular presence in their bedroom as well, which Steve found to his surprise he didn't mind at all. It seemed that once given an outlet, Bucky's dark side didn't overcome them both. Occasionally he was a little rough, occasionally a little cold. Occasionally he did things to Steve that made Steve feel incredibly vulnerable and wanton. But Bucky's needs weren't pent up anymore, so they never exploded.

And they had gotten rid of the marble rolling pin. Steve had found it one day in the drawer, one of the cool, smooth, lightly ridged and bulbous handles completely broken off. He had simply held it up, caught Bucky's eye, blushed very red, and thrown it away. He hoped that Bucky wouldn't resort to kitchen implements ever again. But it seemed that Bucky had acquired a few toys specific for his purposes, so it wasn't necessary... Natasha had apparently taken an interest in their sex life that went a little bit beyond what Steve thought was strictly appropriate, and had made a few purchases on their behalf. Bucky was gleeful about the toys, Steve was abashed and fascinated and dreading. But he soon got acquainted with all of them. Bucky made a smug and slightly menacing project of it.

Even with their years of being linked, Steve had never known that it was possible for another human being to make him feel so many different things, sometimes in the space of a single day or night.

A soft chime broke his reverie. He checked his wristband. "Three minutes to insertion."

"Roger. Go in carefully on this one, Cap, I have a bad feeling."

"Say on, Falcon."

"There aren't enough sentries. Hydra knows what we're doing by now; we should be seeing escalation at each site. Maybe this one is too far off the grid for word to reach, but I doubt it. Smells like a trap."

"Copy. Not much choice but to spring it."

"Roger that."

Wilson had a definite point; there were only two guards, and neither one was covering the entrance. There was also a back door, unmonitored, which had nothing but a mechanical lock and chain on it. The setup was everything but a rolled-out red carpet. "Natasha, I want you to hang back until I check this out. Falcon is right, something smells wrong."

_Bucky._

_I'm with you._

_I think there may be something wrong. Maybe a trap._

_Then don't go in._

_Not an option._

Steve felt a powerful pulse of fear from Bucky, and tried to shake it off, tried to close his mind a little... and realized that he couldn't. Last night, Bucky and Fury had had a rather intense session, and Steve had joined Bucky in a deep mental closeness to help him through it. But now the closeness wouldn't lift. He could almost feel Bucky's thoughts more clearly than his own.

_What's wrong?_

_Nothing._

_Steve, are you actually trying to lie to me?_

Steve decided not to answer. It was nearly three minutes, anyway. _Go time._

_... Okay._

Steve watched the clock for a few more seconds, and then took off toward the back door. It was too obvious, but it was still the best point of ingress. He could feel Bucky's frustration and worry nearly overwhelming his own thoughts. He tried desperately to focus.

_Steve, something's wrong here. Think about Hydra. They always work underhanded... they're sneaking up on you, pal._

_I know, but we don't have a choice. This is the job._ Steve broke the lock and entered. He considered that Bucky might be compromised at the moment, too wounded by last night to be objective about the situation. Steve moved in, down the first darkened hallway. Why was it dark?

_Steve... this is all wrong..._

There was something wrong with the floor. Steve realized this an instant before a _whirrr_ of massive machinery began, and floodlights washed the hallway with brilliance, blinding him. He stumbled, and his feet flew out from under him... he tried to catch himself and his hand slipped on the floor as well. He landed heavily on his side. There was something slippery on a wide stretch of the floor. Steve tried to use his cloth-covered knees and elbows to crawl backward, but they were nearly as bad as his feet; he scrambled for some kind of hold.

A high-pitched screech began, so loud that he grimaced in pain. It became louder, and he dropped his shield and pressed his palms against his ears. He could neither see nor hear nor stand now. Superior senses could be a drawback; now they were being used against him. He shouted into his com unit, "Abort! It's a trap!"

Steve reached out blindly to pick up his shield again, but it was gone. Then he realized that the machinery was humming more loudly. He desperately launched himself forward, skidding along the floor and slamming into a wall that hadn't been there before. It was blocking the hallway, and the surface of it was moving upward. So it had risen from the floor. That meant he could perhaps climb over it; but his attempt was futile, it was already too high and there was no way to stand. He pushed violently against the wall to propel himself backward from it, and almost immediately fetched up against a wall blocking the other side of the hallway. "They've got me boxed in..." he couldn't hear his own voice, and didn't know whether Natasha and Wilson could hear him over the screaming in the air around him. His ears were ringing.

The machinery hummed to a stop, and then began again. Steve couldn't tell what it might be doing beneath the sound of the alarm. But he was being pushed across the floor. The wall was moving. He shoved against it to feel the other wall; it was also moving inward. The space between them was about five feet; he braced his feet against one wall and his hands against the other and pushed as hard as he could. He felt more than heart the machine groan, but he wasn't strong enough to stop it. The walls pushed inexorably inward.

Dimly, deep inside his mind, he could feel Bucky's thoughts, but the chaos around him kept him from interpreting them. He couldn't think, he could only react.

Suddenly everything went dark again, pitch black this time, blinding to his eyes that had just gotten accustomed to the blazing light. The screeching noise stopped abruptly as well, and the silence ached in his ears. He could hear a steady tone in his head, a bad sign. His ears were badly damaged. They would repair themselves quickly, but something told him that his trappers knew that, and... before he could finish the thought, the sound blared out again, deafening him to even his own thoughts. They were deliberately keeping him off-balance.

He stopped moving, trying to think for a second, and the thought that came to him was, _I think I'm going to die here._

_**NO!** _

It was louder than the noise. Bucky's thought overwhelmed him and he clutched both sides of his head helplessly. The walls were now two feet apart, close enough together that Steve could brace himself against both sides and stand. But what was the point? Standing straight would buy him a few more minutes at most. He stood anyway. 12 inches now... and then the walls began to press on him.

The sound ended, and in the brief space of quiet before it began again, he sent out a single thought to Bucky.

_I love you; I'm sorry._

The walls continued to close, and began crushing him. Steve closed his eyes.


	2. Chapter 2

_INITIATE SYSTEM?_

_YES._

* * *

Bucky curled up on the floor, his body twisting and writhing as he tried not to scream. He could feel his ribs cracking, every bone in his body creaking with strain and finally beginning to snap. His ears rang, his eyes burned, and his head was killing him. Steve was out there, dying, and there was nothing that Bucky could do except _feel him die_. Bucky groaned and thrashed, digging grooves in the floor with his metal hand. He was absolutely, fatally helpless. He wondered if he would die along with Steve. He hoped so.

The pain continued for long minutes. The minutes stretched out, and Bucky's mind dimly reached a point of confusion; why wasn't Steve dead yet? Then he realized: whatever was crushing him had ceased to move. Steve was still in massive pain, but alive.

Wherever Steve was, he was crushed beyond normal human capacity to survive, but not past the capacity of his modified metabolism, which was healing itself as fast as the damage occurred. Bucky didn't know how long Steve could persist like that. Perhaps hours, maybe days, but eventually...

Bucky opened his eyes and clenched his teeth, and pushed mentally with all of his strength, and shoved Steve's feelings and sensations into the back corner of his mind. He called on his Winter side to help him. _Be cold, emotionless. Think. Try to be as smart as Steve is, and_ think.

_They have him trapped, and his body is so busy healing that he can't use his mind. So they're not killing him, they're torturing him. Which means they need him alive... and it means that eventually they'll have to stop so that they can question him. So I have time to do something to save him._

His phone buzzed. _FOXTROT_ , said the notification bar. He pressed it to his ear. "Do you know?"

"I know that something went wrong," Fury said calmly. It occasionally irritated Bucky how calm Fury could be in the face of other people dying. "I've lost contact with all three of them. What can you tell me about Rogers?"

"He's been taken alive, but barely. I think they're keeping him alive deliberately. I have to go after him."

"You can spare two minutes to think."

"... about what?"

"About what this means, Barnes. They're keeping him alive. For what?"

"Information."

"What could he possibly tell them that they don't already know? Murders that they've committed? Their own hideouts? Their own personnel? The very, very basic plans we use to clear them out? Or perhaps it's my location he can give them. Except for the fact that I've already moved. Surely they would be smart enough to figure that out."

"Well, obviously they need him for something..."

"I just heard from Banner. Natasha's been badly injured too, gunshot. Wilson managed to fly her out, they're on their way here. So what does it mean that they trapped Rogers, but shot at Natasha and Wilson?"

"Fury, I'm not in the mood for a pop quiz."

"You're not a stupid man, Barnes. I'm ready for you to stop acting like one."

Bucky pounded his metal fist on the wall. He closed his eyes, trying to think. "Gunshot. Steve wasn't shot, he was being crushed. They were careful to keep him alive. You don't shoot at people you want alive. So only Steve matters to them."

"That was my conclusion as well. And why would they only want him? What's the difference between Rogers and Natasha to me? They're equally valuable."

"... but not to me," Bucky said, his stomach clenching. He felt cold all over, suddenly.

"Now who might have the information that they particularly want? Not information for their own use, but information they'd like to prevent us from getting? Who do they _really_ want to kill?"

Bucky tried to think of some way that Fury could be wrong, and couldn't. It was suddenly blindingly obvious.

"Barnes, Rogers is being used as bait."

"For me," Bucky said heavily.

"For you. Sounds like they know your little secret. I have to admit, I'm relieved that you picked up at all. I expected you to have stolen a jet and be halfway there by now. Should I conclude that your little episodes aren't as powerful as they used to be?"

Bucky leaned against the wall. "He doesn't... they don't take me over anymore. I can decide."

"Then, as hard as it is, I suggest you decide to wait until we can come up with a plan."

"Fury, I can wait... for a while. But Steve's in a bad way. He'll die eventually. We can plan if that's what we have to do, but you can't keep me from going. Not this time."

"Barnes, are you strong enough to let him die, if it means saving hundreds of other lives?"

"No," Bucky said flatly. "I'm sorry if that disappoints you, but no."

"Well." Fury sounded weary. "I needed to know."

"So let's figure out a plan. Where can we meet?"

"I'm sending the coordinates to your device."

A fresh wave of pain washed over Bucky as he terminated the connection. He realized that the pain would probably get worse; they would keep increasing the goad to get him there faster.

If they killed Steve, he would bring them bloody, brutal hell.

And they knew that. Which meant... Steve's survival wasn't absolutely assured. Bucky and Fury had a limited window. The last thing Hydra wanted was to give them time to think.

But perhaps even Hydra was a little bit nervous about giving Bucky nothing to lose.

He met Stark, Fury, Wilson, Hill, and to his surprise, Banner, at an oddly respectable-looking office space downtown. Bucky and Banner exchanged a look that said each understood perfectly how the other one felt, and Bucky realized that Banner probably didn't trust himself in Natasha's hospital room. Bucky wondered if the two of them alone could spring Steve; surely nothing on earth could withstand Banner's other form plus Bucky's killing expertise.

Fury dispensed with any preliminaries. "Hydra has Captain Rogers, he's still alive but we don't know for how long. Romanov is down, and two of you are emotionally compromised in a way that makes you nearly as dangerous to us as you are to them."

"Only if you keep us here," Banner said softly. Bucky silently agreed.

Fury continued as though he hadn't heard. "We've all agreed that the most likely scenario is that they're using Rogers as bait for Barnes. Which tells me two things: one, they've got him somewhere Barnes would be expected to find him. And two, they are confident that they can kill Barnes. They must have one hell of an ace up their sleeve to feel that way. Let's deal with the first thing. Barnes, do you know where he is?"

"No," Bucky said. "If they've moved him, they've kept him in too much pain to determine what direction or how far."

"Can you triangulate him somehow?"

"No, this far off the link doesn't work that way. He'd have to show me something, a landmark. Or else it's something that I already know. Some kind of a Hydra safe house."

"Think, Barnes."

Bucky wanted to punch him. He gritted his teeth, pushing Steve's pain out of his consciousness. He thought. _Some place close by his last location. Some place hidden, not an obvious outpost that I would have told Fury about already, some place that nobody but me would guess. Or maybe some place that only Steve would guess..._ It was impossible to think. He shook his head to clear it. Steve was trying to get through, his pain was overcoming him...

No, that wasn't it at all. Bucky promptly opened his thoughts.

_Bucky... recognized... smell... Camp Lehigh... it's Camp Lehigh..._

They had managed to disable his ears and his eyes, but not his nose. _Copy that, Steve._

_Don't... come... here_

_No offense, pal, but you're in no shape to give orders._ With a lump in his throat, Bucky closed off his mind again. "Steve managed to recognize Camp Lehigh, in New Jersey." He paused. "Of course. Zola."

"Zola?" Fury inquired.

"Some kind of a data archive, I think. They never told me exactly what Zola was, and since I've been more than enough of a data archive to you so far, I didn't bring it up yet." Bucky grimaced. "They don't store any weapons or keep any personnel on site. It was abandoned in the eighties, I think."

"Hill, get me the coordinates of Camp Lehigh, I have a hunch."

Hill opened up a laptop and pulled them up, swinging the monitor toward Fury. "There."

Fury nodded. He pulled something out of his pocket; it was a flash drive. "That's where this came from, too."

"What is it?" Stark asked.

"It's the algorithm that Hydra was going to use to find Insight's targets." Fury tapped the drive against the surface of the table. "The origin of this file is the location indicated by those coordinates. We hadn't checked it out yet because Insight was destroyed, rendering the algorithm useless, and we had hotter leads to chase."

"Looks like we didn't after all," Bucky said darkly. "There's something there."

"So it would appear, especially since this program was written two years ago."

"So when do we leave?" said Bucky.

"'Scuse me, don't you mean when do _we_ leave?" Stark said. "You're not going anywhere."

"I'd like to see someone try to stop me," Bucky said evenly.

Stark casually tossed him a small object, which Bucky reflexively caught in his metal hand. His fingers immediately closed tightly over it and his hand dove for the floor, his closed fist hitting it hard enough to crack the cement beneath the carpet. His hand wouldn't open or part from the floor; he was trapped. Bucky promptly reached for his sidearm; the instant he took it out, it flew out of his hand. Stark was holding a metal plate of some kind that was apparently magnetic; he turned a small knob on the side and several other guns and knives ripped themselves out of Bucky's clothing and slammed into the plate.

Bucky struggled to free himself. He glared up at Stark.

Stark shrugged. "Can't be helped. You're too important to risk and too volatile to help."

Bucky pushed at the floor with his legs; it was useless. "But my hand... it shouldn't even be magnetic!"

"Yeah about that, I took the liberty of installing a little bit of safety into your arm when I reconfigured it. Just enough magnetic material to keep you in one place. And the force of the electromagnet in your hand is enough to keep a tiger tank in one place. _And_ this concrete is double-reinforced with rebar. You, sir, are going nowhere. When we rescue Rogers, then I'll turn off the magnet." He looked at Bucky's torn clothing. "Wow. You certainly had some of those weapons stored in strategic locations."

Bucky still had his stone knives. He reached for one to throw at Stark.

"Barnes, are you really sure you want to kill someone right now?" Fury asked.

Bucky tried to control his breathing. His vision had gone tunnel, the way it did when he found a target to eliminate, and his mind was cold and emotionless. Strangely, now with his emotion shut off, he could think logically. Fury and Stark were right. Bucky was too valuable a resource to send straight into a trap that had been specifically designed for him, and Stark had just proven how easily he could be trapped. Of course, Stark had also introduced an unacceptable vulnerability into his body. That alone excused Stark's elimination. Bucky's hand closed around the hilt of a knife, and he stopped himself.

He either needed Stark to rescue Steve, or else he needed to kill Stark to free himself to rescue Steve. Either way, rescuing Steve was the only thing that mattered. Who had a better chance of doing it? Bucky, or Stark? "How were you planning on trapping _him_?" he said roughly, nodding toward Banner.

"Not going to, he's coming," Stark said cheerfully. "The trap wasn't set for him."

Banner, who looked slightly alarmed by the proceedings, said, "Are you sure this is necessary?"

"Oh, it's necessary," said Fury. "Now the only issue is how to keep him from killing all of us once he's free."

Banner looked at Bucky. "Um, you probably can't kill me."

"I can try," Bucky growled.

"I would advise against it."

Bucky looked around the room. Fury was cool and collected as a cat, per usual. Wilson looked completely out of his depth, and had backed away a few steps. Banner looked as though he were trying to think of some other plan. Stark looked self-satisfied and was busying himself on the laptop. Hill looked very composed, and had a Glock 19 pointed directly at Bucky's face.

"Rescue Steve," Bucky said coldly to all of them. "Get him back." _Do that and I might not kill you. Fail, and I will kill you all and lay waste to everybody and everything you ever cared about in your lives._ "I'll give you five hours before I figure a way out of this and come after you."

"Sounds fair to me," Stark said. "Anybody have to go to the bathroom before we go?"


	3. Chapter 3

_"He has friends now."_

_"They won't find us."_

_"How can you be so sure?"_

_"There is an 89.6733% chance that they will not find us. Is that sufficient?"_

_"I'd prefer 99%."_

_"You would prefer not to be here at all, Kenneth. Do you think I do not know this? I know everything."_

_"So you know that they won't find us, but he will?"_

_"Just wait. His conditioning will bring him to us. Rogers is merely the catalyst to bring him out of his hole. I know Barnes; I created him, you see."_

* * *

"Barnes, there is only one thing you can do for your friend right now, and that's be with him."

Bucky glared at Fury. "Is that right?"

"Yes, that is right."

Bucky felt strangely averse to the idea of letting his mind open to Steve's again. Something about Steve, even in excrutiating pain and unable to think, would infect Bucky with mercy and kindness and understanding. Things that Bucky had zero interest in just at that moment.

"Stark, ETA."

Stark's voice came over the speaker phone, "Five minutes."

Bucky said, "If you want me to try to help Steve, you're gonna need to take that into another room."

Fury nodded. "Fair enough." He seemed to hesitate for a moment, and then thought better of it, but he did finally leave the room and take the phone with him.

Bucky closed his eyes and reluctantly opened his mind. _Steve._

_Bucky... don't, don't come here..._

_I'm not. We're sending everybody but me after you. Not my decision._ He sent Steve a snapshot image of himself, all but chained to the floor.

Incongruously, a tiny thread of humor laced Steve's thoughts.

Bucky gritted his teeth. This was _not_ funny. _We're going to find you. They're on their way to Camp Lehigh now._

_Don't... kill anybody..._

Bucky had to smile. _I haven't killed anybody yet, but if they don't find you, bad things will happen to them._

The next message Steve sent wasn't in words, it was only a wave of pain and fear. Bucky reached for all of his years of experience dealing with constant fear and agony and despair, and he tried to give Steve strength.

_Bucky... if I die..._

_You are not going to die._

_But if..._

_Stop it. You are NOT going to die._

_Would you... shut up..._

Bucky bit his lip. _What is it?_

_If I... die... don't spend... your life... avenging me..._

_Steve, that's not your decision._

_I want... you to live... to live, Bucky..._

Bucky blinked tears away. _I can't live without you, so you better not die._

_Trying..._

There was a sudden wave of pain, followed by a strangely relaxed feeling, as though Steve were floating in cool water. He was surrounded by slow waves of it, and they were making him numb, embracing him, putting him slowly to sleep...

Bucky mentally screamed, _**NO!**_ putting all the force behind it he could manage.

Steve's awareness yanked itself back from the brink. _Sorry... getting harder..._

_Just hang in there, Steve. I love you, stay with me. Stay awake. Keep fighting. They're coming to get you._

Steve's thoughts became incoherent, and Bucky felt him skirt the edge of consciousness again.

He was dying.

Fuck five hours. Bucky shoved his awareness of Steve into the back of his mind, closing off all emotion. He pulled out his sharpest stone knife.

* * *

It only took them half an hour to get to New Jersey, but it took far longer to find Rogers. They split up to explore the campground cautiously as Wilson scouted overhead. Wilson's specs and Stark's sensors should have been able to detect any life signs in the camp, but they kept coming up with bizarre readings, as though something were deliberately interfering. So they took the systematic approach and checked each and every building.

It wasn't until Hill put her hand through a wall that they realized what was wrong. Half the buildings weren't actually there.

Stark was amazed; he'd never found a way to make holograms work at night and look realistic. The fake buildings were perfect until you stepped inside the illusion, at which point you could no longer see it until you stepped back out. It accounted a little for the crazy readings; Wilson and Stark had been trying to account for walls and rooms that weren't there. But there was still something interfering.

Banner stepped inside an illusion and promptly disappeared with a yelp. Stark immediately flew over and realized that the building hologram in question had been covering an incredibly large, deep pit; deep enough that all Stark could hear was a faint rumbling and crashing from below. Doubtless the fall had brought out Banner's charming side. Stark peered inside. "Uh... Hulk?"

A yowling roar emerged from the depths, but no Hulk. Stark dove in, turning on all his lights. "Guys, we have ourselves a dungeon of doom it appears, and Banner has discovered it and become our little green friend." The walls, he noted as he descended, were remarkably smooth and metallic. He was halfway down before he was met by the Hulk leaping upward and attempting to dig for a handhold in the wall; its fingers made dents in the metal, but not deeply enough to catch itself. It fell. Stark followed it.

Down at the very bottom, the space widened out, and Stark's sensors suddenly began to pick something up. "There are signs of life down here! Whoa!" He dodged one of the Hulk's fists. "Shit, he's in a bad mood!" He swung around the Hulk and found a passageway to dart into. The life signs seemed to be in this direction. He was also picking up large amounts of electricity, infrared, and sound waves... whoever was in there had to be experiencing the equivalent of hell.

His helmet shielded him from the worst of it as he shot into the room which seemed to be nothing more than a large square with a gigantic cube of some kind of metal sitting in the middle of it. Stark analyzed it; lead. Far too heavy for Stark to lift. There was a small space beneath the cube. He could melt it, but that would be a bad idea if there was something important beneath it...

He turned on his megaphone. "HULK! I NEED YOU IN HERE!"

A very large life sign began to slowly creep toward him; the Hulk was digging his way through the passage, which had walls of stone rather than slippery metal. Stark half wondered whether a cave-in might happen, but a quick core sampling scan told him that the rock above them was incredibly solid, without a lot of fault lines.

The Hulk's head and shoulders emerged into the room, covered with rubble. It looked around.

Stark waved. "Move THAT!" he pointed at the cube, hoping that the creature's mood had cooled after some nice exercise.

The Hulk took one step and smashed its fist into the side of the leaden cube, which slid a little to the side and then began to tip as the Hulk continued to press in, adding the weight of its shoulder. Finally the cube balanced on one edge, and then toppled over on its side, revealing the hole beneath.

Stark had expected to see Rogers there, and was half afraid to find him dead.

Instead, the hole was covered by steel bars, thick as a man's ankle and criss-crossed over a pool of some kind of dark liquid. Stark's sensors were slowly going madder and madder, and he was unable to analyze the liquid; it could have been brackish water, petroleum, blood... The unidentified life signs might have been coming from beneath it, or perhaps not. In any case, there was something in that hole that someone very much did not want to get out of the hole, and that was a tiny bit too perfect to be a coincidence. Rogers had to be down there.

Stark turned around, something about this wasn't right...

The passageway was gone. There was nothing there but a shiny metal wall. Stark pressed against it; it held, it was real. He backed away and fired his repulsors at it; not a dent. It looked suspiciously bullet-proof and reflective.

The Hulk was calming down, which meant that soon it would become Banner again. Banner, who wasn't immune to the hellish conditions in the room; Stark's suit told him that there were toxic fumes in here. It occurred to him that the hole might be filled with bromine.

"Fuck."

"Repeat transmission, Stark?" Hill sounded concerned.

"Hulk and I are stuck in a pit with moving trapdoors and what the fuck is this, Indiana Jones?" _If it is, there'll be a lever somewhere..._ He scanned the room. Interference was at maximum. He was tempted to use EMP, but wasn't sure how being plunged into sudden darkness might affect the Hulk.

"Repeat transmission, Stark?"

"I said we're trapped! Can you hear me?"

"Repeat transmission, Stark?" The voice began to warp and squeal horribly. "Repeat transmission, Stark? Repeat transmission, Stark? Repeat transmission, Stark?" It was no longer Hill's voice at all.

Stark muted his com, swearing.

He looked up at the ceiling.


	4. Chapter 4

_"Stark! The bird has left the cage, repeat, the bird has flown. Stark, do you read me?"_

_"I read you."_

_"I need you to use extreme caution."_

_"I read you."_

_"Stark, are you alright?"_

_"I read you. I read you. I read you..."_

* * *

"Hill, should I come down there?"

"Negative Wilson, stay airborne. If something happens to me, you need to be able to report back." Hill carefully made her way to where she thought Stark and Banner had disappeared, touching every building to see which ones were real. "Are you reading them yet?"

"No, they disappeared when they fell into the pit. You're a hundred yards east of it now."

"Roger that." She started to run. Ten yards from the pit she stopped, feeling abruptly sick. "Wilson, check for electromagnetic interference in this area."

"Nope, none. What I'm getting instead is... wait, can that be right?"

"What is it?"

"Hill, get out of there, you're being bathed in gamma radiation!"

She stumbled backward, her vision going double.

"I'm coming down to get you!"

"Negative, stay airborne! I'm fine." She forced herself to stand up, carefully pointed her feet in the opposite direction from what she was facing, and broke into a shuffling jog. She made it twenty paces before falling; as she lost consciousness, she had a sudden flare of anger over the fact that she couldn't make sense of any of this. It wasn't Hydra's M.O. to play games.

Hill was awoken by the sensation of being carried; she was slung over someone's shoulder like a sack of potatoes. She kept her eyes closed, not knowing whether she was being carried off by a friend or foe and not really in a position to attack... suddenly her rescuer dropper her ungently onto the ground. She let herself fall flat, her eyes still closed. Her rescuer knelt beside her; the grace of his movements said he was a fighter, and she wasn't going to get out of this easily. There was a soft noise.

Then, there was the unmistakable feeling of a gun barrel pressed against her forehead.

Reflexively she tried to knock it away with her hands and kick herself up, but she was still weak from whatever had happened to her earlier. The gun left her forehead and there was a gunshot fired directly next to her ear. It wasn't intended to hit her, it was intended to deafen and confuse her; it worked. She felt as though her eardrum had been split open and her head was pounding.

Hill opened her eyes. She wanted to see her killer before she died.

His face and eyes were covered with a black mask, transforming him into a shadow in the darkness. Then he stood up, gun still pointed at her, silhouetted against the night sky. She saw that his left arm terminated in a stump that seemed to have something coming out of it... wires?

Then she knew exactly who it was.

He had cut through his arm like a trapped wolf chewing off its own paw.

"Barnes..."

He cut her off. "Did you find him?"

"No," she said, knowing that answer might get her killed.

"Where are the others?"

"If Wilson followed orders, he's still in the air; Stark and Banner have fallen into some kind of a deep pit, about thirty yards from where you found me."

He knelt beside her again, tapping the gun against the side of his knee. "Why shouldn't I just kill you all?"

"Because Steve wouldn't want you to."

The Winter Soldier made a low growling noise, and then stood up. He pointed the gun at her head.

There was a rumbling sound to the west. Suddenly there was a massive crunching sound as rocks were blasted into the sky as though flung up by dynamite; bolts of energy shot out of a new hole in the ground that was rapidly expanding in size as rocks continued to be catapulted out of it. A large boulder landed just to the left of them. The Soldier quickly picked Hill up again and ran until they were well out of range of the seeming volcano that was emerging in the woods.

The rumbling and crashing sounds paused, and there was silence for a moment until a bright spark of red suddenly shot into the sky and arched back down to the ground.

"Hill, for the love of Christ tell me you read me now!"

"I read you, Stark," she said calmly. "Barnes is here."

The Soldier made a hissing noise and dropped her. Hill grunted, and pushed herself into a sitting position.

"He's _here_?"

"Just as well, considering the situation is not under control," she said resignedly.

"Well, tell him I have some good news and some bad news."

"Barnes, Stark says he has some information for you."

The Soldier pointed at Stark, who was coming straight for them through the trees, followed awkwardly by Banner, whose clothing was torn and ragged.

"Hoy there, non-sailors." Stark pointed a glowing hand at the Soldier. "Do the killing thing later. Steve's down there, I wasn't able to get him out because I had to save Banner." He looked at Banner. "You picked a great time to go all normal on me."

Banner said, "Natasha woke up."

"And you got sentimental?"

"I know where Steve is," the Soldier said, coldly. "He's very close to dying." He turned on his heel and began to walk toward the barracks.

"Where are you going?" Stark called.

"To make a deal," said the Soldier. "Follow me, and I _will_ kill you."


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am aware that this story has plot holes big enough to drive a truck through, but it's SO MUCH FUN to write...

_"Ready the trap."_

_"You said we wouldn't need it..."_

_"I said that there was a chance we would not need it. That chance is roughly 63%. Barnes has been contaminated."_

_"Do you want him alive?"_

_"Negative. If I can't reach him, capture him. If you can."_

_"You almost sound like you want me to fail."_

_"Well, it would certainly prove my genius, would it not?"_

* * *

Bucky knew where to go. He didn't know how he knew, but he knew. There was a padlock on the door, which he shot off. He didn't care whether the others followed him or not. He no longer cared about anything save the last tiny bit of breath that was left in Steve's lungs.

Portraits of the original SHIELD leaders were on the wall. He didn't bother to look at them. He knew he was in the original SHIELD headquarters, and he knew that Zola was below him somewhere. It took a little searching to find the hidden elevator, and once again he had to appeal to the random directional instinct he suddenly seemed to have. He found it, and went down.

Yellowing lights flickered on as he entered the room. There was a hub on a table that looked relatively dust-free compared to the rest of the technology and furniture in the room. Bucky walked over to it and took the flash drive out of his pocket. He shoved it into one of the slots. The monitor nearest him blinked itself alive.

_INITIATE SYSTEM?_

He typed _YES_ and hit the Enter key.

Suddenly the room awoke, tapes spinning in hundreds of large crates that seemed to be old servers. The technology was recognizable; it looked, on a larger scale, like what Hydra had used to capture memories.

"Greetings, Sergeant Barnes."

The voice was slightly nasal, accented, and intimately familiar. It made him feel sick. "Zola," he said, and for the first time, his memories locked into place effortlessly and he knew who he was talking to.

"It is good to see you." There was pleasure evident in the voice; it truly meant what it said.

"Sure of that, are you?" Bucky said. "When you know I'm going to try to destroy you?"

"That would be only appropriate. How often does it happen that a student overreaches the expertise of his mentor? How often does the prince kill the king and assume the throne? And you are both my student and my child. I expected amazing things from you, and you have outshone even my highest hopes."

Bucky looked around the room. He realized that they had written Zola's entire mind into the data banks surrounding him. Probably under his guidance as well. It was as though he were standing inside Zola's brain.

"But I see you are damaged! What has happened to you, my son?"

"Don't call me that," snapped Bucky. "I'm not yours."

"You are my magnum opus, Sergeant Barnes. My pinnacle of genius. You are by far the most advanced weapon in human form that exists on the planet today."

"I take it you haven't met Iron Man."

"Ah, yes, he has greater firepower, but lacks the subtlety of your construction, especially your hand. What has happened to it?"

"I cut it off."

"Again you amaze me. The electrical impulses in your arm must have caused you agony as you cut through the wires."

Bucky said nothing.

"I have no doubt that your friend Tony Stark can construct for you a new hand. But beware that he does not place his own little tricks within it. I knew his father well, and the apple does not fall far from the tree."

Bucky was silent, this time feeling uncomfortable at how accurate Zola's guesses were.

"Ah, Sergeant Barnes, you have been a quiet one for many, many years. Do you even remember now who you were before I began to change you? Once, you were quite talkative. You even charmed your jailers, and nearly escaped several times. It was on that basis that I chose you."

Bucky felt as though he were being hypnotized. He shook himself free of the feeling. "I'm here on business, Zola. To trade myself for Steve Rogers. I know you have him."

"I accept." Suddenly a blast door closed over the elevator doors. "I have removed the plasma interferons from the room and I have lifted the cage. Your friends will soon rescue him."

Bucky checked the link... he felt a sudden relief from Steve as the horrible lights and sounds and fumes finally stopped, and the stabbing wires were removed as well as the crushing wall against his chest. Steve could breathe. His heart began to speed up as his body began to heal itself, and with it... Bucky suddenly thrust all awareness of Steve away from him and closed it off into one corner of his mind, but he could still feel the sudden wild anger and fear as Steve realized what Bucky must have done.

No point in thinking about it now.

"So what is it you want with me?" Bucky asked.

"Why, I wanted to see you one last time, before the end."

"The end?"

"Of course. No man lives forever, not even on these data banks. I am slowly corroding and rotting from the inside. Many of my tapes no longer spin. I am dying, and I wished to see my child once more before death. Even if he has betrayed everything I created him for." The voice sounded reproachful.

"Everything you created me for? You didn't create me for anything except killing people."

"And thus you show your ignorance. Do you not realize how you have shaped this century? All the good you have done?" The monitors around Bucky suddenly lit up, showing news articles, television spots, all related to the effects of Bucky's crimes. "It is because of you that Hydra nearly succeeded."

"And it's because of me that Hydra failed."

"True. You always had that power within you. But until you were corrupted by your link to Steve Rogers, you never would have used it."

"Corrupted," Bucky spat out. "Of course you would say that."

"Why would I not? Has he not corrupted you? Have you not begun to live with him, share a house together? Do you not share a bed, and intimacies that are an abomination between men?"

Bucky felt slapped. "How dare you."

"How dare I? How dare you? Did it not start even as you were children? Did you not realize the shame of it then? Of course you did, it was a deeply shameful memory that we recorded from you."

Bucky realized everything that Hydra knew about him, and his face flushed in humiliation and anger. "There was nothing to be ashamed of."

"Of course there was. You knew it then, you know it now, deep within yourself. You know that Steve Rogers has corrupted you, taken the pure thing that I made of you and made you a thing of evil habits and evil company."

Bucky felt short of breath. His mind was reeling, trying to think of some argument he could make, some way he could convince Zola that what he had with Steve was good, and right, and healthy... somewhere deep inside of himself, though, there was still a sense of shame. A sense that he was getting away with something.

Before, he had been a murderer. But wasn't there a kind of logic in what Zola was saying? Wasn't he purer, then? His intentions had been all aligned. That was a kind of purity. Ever since Steve had saved him, Bucky's thoughts and feelings had become a chaos.

He could feel the presence of Steve pushed to the back of his mind, pulsing angrily as it tried to make itself heard, and for the first time in his entire life, Bucky wished that he could just make it go away.

The voice was sad. "You cannot imagine how I have suffered, knowing what has become of you. Knowing the filth you have descended to."

Bucky suddenly remembered every single kinky or risky thing he and Steve had ever done during sex. He remembered nearly hurting Steve. He remembered Natasha's visits. Deep in his gut, the shame was starting to burn. He looked at the floor. He truly felt as Zola said: filthy.

"I created you to accomplish wonders, and you have relegated yourself to paltry obscenities instead. Despite my pride in you, as a parent I also feel disappointment in you, and I feel disappointment in myself. I have obviously failed you in some way."

Something about this conversation was suddenly eerily familiar. Bucky looked up at the monitor with its green sliding approximation of Zola's face. "You used to talk to me like this, after my missions."

"Of course I talked to you. I told you what you needed to hear in order to continue the work you were meant for."

"But then you died..." Bucky blinked. "Or you were transformed, and you never came again. And so nobody would talk to me at all. And I..." He paused. "I started to die." It felt silly and overdramatic, but it was true. At some point during the seventies, Bucky's existence had subtly changed. Nobody cared about him anymore. He was only an object. "I was a tool. A thing."

"I never saw you that way, you know this."

"I know," Bucky said. "In some sick way, you really did think that you created me."

"Not in some sick way. In every way, I created you. And I loved you."

A new memory swept through Bucky like a shower of clear water. He remembered lying in a frozen box, slowly emerging to consciousness, and hearing a quiet voice say over and over again, _I love you. I will never stop looking for you. I love you._

Steve had loved him without manipulating him into becoming something else. Steve had loved him as a kid, had loved him as an adult, had loved him as a murderer, would love him no matter what. Zola had only loved him as a creature that he had made. Steve had loved _Bucky_ , just as he was.

Zola was continuing on, but somehow Bucky couldn't pay attention anymore. All he could think of was Steve, running next to him through the streets as kids. Steve, getting into fights with every bully in town. Steve, wearing stars and stripes and doing his best to fight everything he could that was evil. Steve, who loved him. Steve, smiling at him in the morning light. Steve, protecting him from Fury and anybody else who might seek to use him. Steve, holding him in the night after nightmares. Steve, sitting quietly by while Natasha whipped the penance out of him. Steve, who would rather have died than know that Bucky was standing here now.

He remembered Steve's body surrendering itself to him, and how beautiful it was, and how nothing on earth could ever feel the same as that. The power he exercised, that Steve yielded to him, had its own purity. It was purely Steve and Bucky. Nobody could ever make it unclean.

Bucky's shoulders straightened, and his forehead smoothed. He smiled gently at the monitor. "Zola."

"Yes, my son?"

"You are not my creator. You never truly loved me. And you have no power over me."

Bucky opened his mind to Steve, letting Steve feel everything that Bucky had just realized about the two of them, welcoming Steve into every nook and cranny of his mind and showing Steve that everywhere there were traces of his touch, of his love. He said, _I love you, so much that it kills me, and heals me, and makes me into a new man._

_Oh, Bucky. What have you done?_ The thought was aching, broken.

_What I had to do. If I can make it back to you, if there is any mercy in the universe fit to see a monster like me turn into a human being and love someone else more than the entire world, then I will come back._

Zola said, "You sadden me."

Every light in the room promptly went black, and Bucky thought, _Well, now I've done it._


	6. Chapter 6

_"We've recovered Rogers, but I'm not sure we'll be able to bring him back without a tranquilizer gun."_

_"Barnes gave himself up, didn't he?"_

_"He must have. Suddenly all of the fluid drained and the cage opened..."_

_"What fluid?"_

_"Never mind. The point is, none of us know where Barnes is, now. And whoever is running this place knew we were coming a long time ago... we wondered why Hydra's sites weren't better defended, well, now we know. They were focusing all of their attention here, just waiting for us to come. The entire site is weaponized. And someone knows exactly how to defeat most of our sensor technology... I'd love to know just where they got their intel from."_

_"Do you think, if you stay, that you can find Barnes?"_

_"Not easily and not soon. He did his melting-into-the-scenery bit and disappeared, and my sensors are all but fried. I think we need to meet up and regroup."_

_"Fine. Get Rogers here ASAP, if you have to tie him up and drag him."_

* * *

_Well, now I've done it._

The thought lasted a fragment of a second; Bucky was already moving before it finished, diving for a more defensible position behind the monitors. He already had the layout of the room memorized, but it wasn't necessary. Darkness was his element. His eyes adjusted in a single blink.

In the place where he had just been standing, a cage slammed down.

_A cage? He's not trying to kill me outright?_ Bucky checked the room; there were five Hydra operatives closing on him, all wearing night-vision goggles, which meant their field of vision was more restricted than his own, especially above the typical line of sight. He rolled over to the nearest row of data banks and hefted himself on top of them, nearly silently but a little slower than he would have normally been able to do, given that he only had one hand. _Only five operatives. Zola isn't trying to capture or kill me, he can't be, he'd do a better job than this. What is this, some kinda test?_ He pulled out a throwing knife. He had seven of them.

He only needed to use four. The last member of Hydra, seeing his compatriots die around him, began to retreat. He didn't get far. Bucky slipped silently down and intercepted him with a neat uppercut to the jaw. The man went down. Bucky flexed his hand; it had been a while since he'd used his organic hand to punch anybody.

Zola's voice suddenly punctured the darkness. "Why can you not see, my child? When it is so obvious what a perfect machine you are?"

Bucky smelled a slight change in the air. He immediately put on his mask and goggles. Zola could talk all he wanted to, Bucky was done responding. His only goal now was to destroy this room, and somehow make it out alive.

"You are a machine meant to kill, to decimate the enemy and his resources, but most of all, to _survive_."

Once again Zola had hit too close to the truth, and Bucky felt uncomfortable. He dropped to the floor. _If Steve were here, his only focus would be on killing Zola. He wouldn't even worry about surviving. Then again, if Steve had any sense of self-preservation, I wouldn't need to be here._

"The gas that is filling the room is being run through a filtration system. It is replacing the oxygen. Your mask can stop my poison, but it cannot create oxygen where there isn't any. You have barely minutes to decide... will you live, or will you die?"

With a sinking feeling, Bucky realized that he was completely unprepared for this. He had re-armed himself before setting off, but guns were no use here, not against an entire room full of equipment. What he needed were explosives.

"So what will you do, Sergeant Barnes? Will you set me on fire? You would have to do something drastic to kill me, and I think you would need to kill yourself to do it. I don't think you will do that."

There was one thing Bucky could use, though. Something he'd brought with him almost as an afterthought.

He pulled out the metal plate he had slung over his shoulder and placed it flat against one of the data banks.

"I can feel you there... you have told me where you are. What do you think you are doing? You can't possibly destroy me by hand... your single hand."

Bucky smiled grimly. He thumbed the switch on the handle to full. He swept the plate up and down, slowly.

"What. What. What are you doing? What have you done?" The voice sounded deeply offended.

Bucky took Stark's electromagnetic plate to the next data bank and began to run it up and down the side of the machine... erasing the tapes inside.

"Barnes, you must answer me." The lights in the room suddenly flickered back on, and Bucky realized that Zola must need them to see through the cameras that served as his eyes.

_You're old tech, Zola. Just like I am._ Bucky moved to the third data bank in the line. He wasn't sure whether he could erase all of them in the time he had available to him, but he would do what he could.

"Ah, I see. You are indeed clever, but it will not work. Your time would be better spent looking for a way out of the room."

Bucky grimly continued to sweep the magnet across the tapes.

"Sergeant Barnes, stop what you are doing. I do not wish to kill you."

Bucky moved to the next data bank.

"Sergeant Barnes, listen to my voice. Stop this. You are not killing me, you are merely wasting the last minutes of your own life."

The voice sounded absolutely sure of itself, almost compassionate for him in his mistaken belief that he could kill it; Bucky didn't let himself hesitate. He continued.

"But you were always stubborn, weren't you? Did you not imagine that my data banks would be protected from anything so simple as a strong magnet?"

The voice persisted in trying to discourage him as Bucky kept sweeping the magnet up and down. It persisted until he finally completed the entire row and moved to the next one. Bucky guessed that with the gas in the room, Zola didn't dare bring more human assistants inside.

"Sergeant Barnes, stop. I do not wish to see my creation destroyed in this way. In fact, I..." there was a sudden screech of static and the voice twisted, lowered. "Barnes. Cease what you are doing."

Bucky nodded to himself; Zola was beginning to feel the damage. Bucky kept going.

"Has it occurred to you what will happen if you die? The damage you would do to your noble cause would be profound."

Bucky paused for a second, but then continued. The voice wasn't going to convince him to stop, no matter what.

"You can still save yourself, you know. You can find a way out of this room."

Bucky kept going.

He heard a sound and glanced up; the reinforced doors were opening, revealing the elevator entrance. "Do you see, Barnes? I am willing to set you free rather than see you needlessly die."

Bucky gritted his teeth. He kept going.

"Steve Rogers."

Bucky stopped for a moment, glancing at one of the monitors in surprise.

"If you stop this, you still have a chance to see him again."

The air was starting to grow thin behind his mask. Bucky blinked. He stood with the plate in his hand for a moment, uncertain.

"You can still go to him. I let him go to your friends, he is alive and recovering."

Bucky felt tears come to his eyes. He took a deep breath, feeling the lack of oxygen, and kept going with the magnet.

The voice continued to plead, to cajole, to persuade, until Bucky thought he would go mad listening to it. There were over 2000 square feet of data banks to cover in the room; he would never get to the end before his air ran out. He would die, possibly before damaging Zola badly enough to kill him. So why was the voice so intent upon stopping him?

"Do you think I am pleading for my life, you stupid man? When I would let myself be destroyed in a moment for the cause? I care nothing for my own life. I am pleading for yours! Go! Now!"

There was the faintest possibility that the voice was not lying. Zola was right, there was no way Bucky could finish in time to live. So Zola was in no real danger, but the voice was nonetheless beginning to sound desperate.

Bucky didn't want to die. He kept going with the magnet.

"You would sacrifice yourself to kill me, is that it? You will die nonetheless."

Bucky paused, trying to think. He was beginning to feel dizzy. There was still time; he could make a dash for the elevators. He could make it back to Steve. He could live.

Suddenly what he was doing felt completely stupid and pointless. Bucky almost broke for the elevator, and stopped himself. _No._ He kept going. He had forgotten why.

"Bucky..." The familiar name sounded awkward in Zola's voice; a bad mimicry of affection. "Why do you think I brought you here? To kill you? No. There were easier ways to kill you, my son."

Bucky couldn't focus anymore. He felt strange now; as though he were floating through the room instead of standing.

And then he wasn't standing.

"Sergeant Barnes, remove your mask immediately."

He recognized the voice, recognized it as an authority of some kind; it was difficult to tell through the fog in his mind. He dutifully removed his mask and goggles. Something in the air made his eyes smart and water.

He took two deep breaths, and passed out.


	7. Chapter 7

_"What's the damage?"_

_"It looks like almost none of the main memory banks were erased, but you've lost half your processing capacity."_

_"I don't need it. Everything that we need, we now have."_

* * *

Steve Rogers was a miracle of medical and genetic science, but even he could get the shit kicked out of him, and this was one of those times, loath as he was to admit to it. Almost all of his ribs were cracked, it was agony to breathe, his ears were still ringing, his eyes watery, and he was bleeding in half a dozen places from deep punctures. He could easily have used a week (or a month) in the hospital, but he didn't have that luxury. Hydra had had an interest in keeping him alive. They had no such interest in Bucky. Which he tried to explain to the others, and was ignored.

_Bucky,_ he called repeatedly. Bucky's mind had gone dark hours ago and there was no response. Steve and Bucky could usually wake each other up with a sharp mental poke. It wasn't working now, but Bucky wasn't dead.

"But why isn't he dead?" Stark said, openly baffled but indifferent to the implications of what he was saying in a way that made Steve want to strangle him.

"I don't know."

"You're sure of it, though?"

"I would know."

"I'm just saying that you've never actually experienced having your Other die on you..."

"Enough, Stark," Fury said wearily. "If Rogers says he's alive, then he's alive."

Steve was holding Bucky's severed metal hand. He gently touched the fingers. "He's handicapped out there. Because of you." He looked at Stark.

"And let's not start that argument again, either," Fury said. "We're going in circles. Doc, how's Hill?"

Dr. Russo was busily examining Hill with a Geiger counter; she was lying on a cot, looking ill. He shut it off with a puzzled expression. "If she was exposed to enough radiation to experience symptoms as quickly as she did, she should have been exposed to enough of it to be putting out significant rads. She's clean. Whatever it was, it wasn't gamma."

"It was _something_ ," Wilson said.

"It was a disguise of some kind," said Fury. "Someone wanted us out, and out fast. So they were using gas, and scare tactics with your sensors. They wanted everybody running scared... except Barnes."

"And they succeeded. We ran," Steve said, bitterly.

"To get _you_ to safety," Stark emphasized.

"At Bucky's expense!" Steve fired back.

Wilson's voice broke in, calmly. "So why didn't they kill him? We still haven't figured that out."

"No, we haven't," Fury said. "We know Rogers was the bait for Barnes, but Barnes isn't bait for anybody except Rogers--"

"Because I'm the only one who cares about him--"

"--And they gave Rogers up without a fight. Despite the fact that they could have kept him, they could have killed him easily, and had them both."

Steve rubbed his forehead, trying to think. "Bucky would have known if I were killed. Maybe they have some reason to want him... cooperative."

"Do you think he would cooperate with them, after what they did to him?" Fury asked.

Steve hated himself for saying it, but he couldn't deny the truth. "He was brainwashed once, so effectively that I nearly couldn't reach him again. He might still be susceptible." _Bucky, what are they doing to you?_ He clenched Bucky's hand in his own, tightly enough to make the metal plates grind against each other.

"I wouldn't be surprised by that," Stark said, "Given how he played directly into their hands."

"To save me!" Steve stood up, ready to fight.

"Which we could have done ourselves!" Stark said, putting down his tablet.

"Yeah, you were doing a brilliant job when he found you, you were trapped in a pit and Hill was unconscious!"

"Minor details, all it would have taken was--"

"I DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT HOW MINOR THIS IS TO YOU!" Steve shouted.

"FINE, because frankly I have better things to be doing than repeatedly rescuing your helpless ass!"

"STOP!" Fury yelled in a surprisingly strong voice. "This. Is not acceptable. We are _not_ going to do this for the next hour. This is time we need to be using to _think_. Stark, I need to know why they were able to interfere with your sensors. Rogers, I need you to make some kind of contact with Barnes. Neither of these things involves fighting with each other like kids on a playground."

Steve glared hatred at Stark for a few more moments, and then sat down heavily, closing his eyes. "Bucky is still out cold."

"Then keep trying. You're our only link to him. Stark?"

"I'm on it, and I'll have an answer in the next few minutes as long as I'm not interrupted by--"

"Interrupted by what, Stark?"

"... nothing," Stark said sourly, picking up his tablet again. "Absolutely nothing."

Everybody sat in silence for the next half hour, unbroken except for the light tapping of Stark's fingertips against the screen of his tablet and Hill's labored breathing.

Steve pressed Bucky's hand against his forehead and sent out call after call, trying to reach through the link to shake Bucky somehow, to wake him up. _Come on, buddy. Come back to me. I was able to get to you when you were frozen, why can't I get to you now?_ He pushed and pushed. _Bucky, answer me. What have they done to you?_

Finally, he received back something like a reply, but not in words. He had a faint sense of unease that he wasn't sure was coming from him.

_Bucky, it's me! Wake up, just listen to the sound of my voice, wake up..._ The sense of unease grew stronger, became something like an emotion.

The emotion was shame.

_Bucky, what's wrong?_

A thought crept through their link, small and quiet. _I failed._

_To do what?_

_To kill my target._

_What target, Bucky?_

A few images flashed through Steve's head, melding together and unclear. One of the faces might have been Nick Fury, but it was gone too quickly to recognize. Then there was an image of countless rows of machines in a large, square room. Each one of the machines had a face on it... Arnim Zola.

"Zola."

Everybody turned to look at Steve. He lifted his head.

Fury said, "Barnes mentioned that name, but he didn't know who it was."

"He was a scientist that worked with the Red Skull back during the war. And he was the one who turned Bucky into... what he is now."

"Why didn't Barnes mention him before? Why didn't you?"

"Bucky's mind was wiped so many times that all you were getting from him were the memories of the murders he'd committed, because that was the only thing they wanted him to keep," Steve said. "I honestly forgot about Zola. He seemed... timid... next to the Red Skull. Zola was the only Hydra operative we ever caught that didn't kill himself. I always thought that meant he wasn't truly devoted to them. But why is he even here?"

"So Barnes has made contact with you?"

"Barely. Hang on a second." Steve closed his eyes again. _Bucky. Did you try to kill Zola?_

_Yes, but I was confused._

_What do you mean?_

_I was corrupted by Steve Rogers into betraying my mission._

Steve kept his eyes closed, feeling cold all the way down to his bones.

He felt sick, injured, weak. He felt helpless in the face of what was happening to Bucky, and helpless to get the others to understand that he needed to go and find him. He could still feel the last strong message he'd gotten from Bucky, an ocean of feelings, all loving and hoping, the determination to come back and find Steve somehow... followed by black silence as Bucky had somehow closed him out, and then a deeper blackness when he went unconscious.

Steve was tired, ill, and feeling ready to surrender.

But he had felt this way before.

It always felt like this at the climactic point of a mission; there was often that moment of, "What am I doing here? Why is this so important?" A deep questioning of everything around you, as you wondered whether or not it was real. Profound philosophical angst in the midst of torture, or wounds, or watching your friends get shot in the face; Steve had felt it almost every single time he'd been in the field. And he knew the secret: it would go away if he got angry.

So he got angry.

Steve reached beneath his wounds and his weariness and found a hellish pit of rage that had been burning inside of him for years, quietly infecting everything he had experienced since losing Bucky the first time, watching him fall into that ravine. The rage of losing his Other. The rage of being trapped in ice for decades while Bucky was tortured and turned into a killer. The rage of losing all the hopes of his former life, and then suddenly getting them back when he found and saved Bucky; the rage of seeing what Bucky had been turned into, the rage of watching others refute Steve's attempts to bring him back from that life of murder and death. The rage of so nearly being _happy_ and _whole_ and then having it snatched away from him.

Steve was shaking so hard that Bucky's hand was clinking softly in his grip, and he barely noticed. He thought a single, calm thought: _As of now, I am tired of this._

And then he sent his anger at Bucky like a short-range ballistic missile. It traveled through the link, gathered and pooled at the edges of Bucky's consciousness, and then exploded into a million fiery fragments of emotion, red-hot and pulsing with vicious life.

Bucky woke up.


	8. Chapter 8

_"There's only one explanation for it. Hydra infiltrated Stark Industries."_

_"Why didn't Barnes tell us?"_

_"Maybe he didn't know."_

_"So what does that mean?"_

_"You're not going to like what it means."_

* * *

Bucky opened his eyes and bared his teeth, snarling as he pushed against the metal cuffs trapping his arms. He could feel the strain in the screws, but they didn't break.

He was enraged.

No, wait. _Steve_ was enraged. Bucky took a deep breath and tried to calm himself. _Why are you so angry?_

_WAKE UP._

_I'm awake!_ Bucky scanned the room. It was brutally cold in here, and he was surrounded by freezers, rows upon rows of them. Each one had a window, rimed with frost on the inside. It was dim, but he thought he could make out something behind the windows... faces. There were people in there. Dozens of them.

Amid the freezers were tables covered in metal parts, some of them recognizable as body parts. Metal hands, feet, legs arms.

He was tightly clamped into a metal seat, next to a console. Everything about this felt familiar. He glanced up. There was a curved metal bar arching over his head, and attached to it were two halves of a rounded head-plate.

It was a mind wiper. He immediately started struggling.

 _Bucky!_ Steve's mental voice still sounded enraged.

Bucky sent Steve back an image of everything he was seeing, and tried to suppress some of the panic he was feeling. _Pal, I think I'm in trouble._

He felt Steve absorb everything he was seeing. And he felt a memory, not his own. It was Colonel Phillips ( _Who is Colonel Phillips?_ ), his face creased and disappointed and angry, his voice cold. _"I asked for an army and all I got was you. You are not enough."_

Bucky looked around the room again. Frozen people, metal parts. _Zola has been trying to make an army._

_But something is wrong._

_He would have started decades ago, wouldn't he?_

_Yes, which means he should have more prototypes by now._

_But all he ended up with was me._

_So what's special about you?_

_Nothing._

There was a flare of angry impatience from Steve, it felt like a slap. _Bucky. What is special about you? There must be something._

Bucky tried to think. Not for the first time, he wished he was as smart as Steve.

_You ARE._

_Steve, this is not the time for a pep talk. We both know you're the clever one._

_And you've just proved it by completely missing my point. You don't need to be just like me. I'm there with you! USE ME, YOU BONEHEAD!_

Bucky nearly laughed. Steve was right; they were so close to being one person... and everything that was the both of them was required here. Bucky closed his eyes and opened his mind. _Fine. Help me figure this out._ He felt Steve plunge into his mind. It felt completely different from Steve's usual delicate mental touch; this was invasive and urgent, and Bucky could still taste the underlying essence of Steve's rage...

_Why are you so angry at me?_

_I told you to stay away!_

_Could you have stayed away?_ Steve didn't answer, he just kept forcing himself through the pathways of Bucky's mind. It was reminiscent of something that they had done before, but Bucky couldn't quite put his finger on it. Then he realized: this was like rough sex. Except that during rough sex, Bucky was usually the one in charge. Now Steve was on top, and he was being brutal about it. Bucky realized he was panting, and had an aching erection; worst time possible for it, but he couldn't help it... this was rough intimacy on an entirely different level from what they usually experienced with each other mentally.

He could feel Steve's body responding as well.

He could _feel_ Steve's body. Almost as though it were his own.

It _was_ his own.

And with that, he no longer knew who he was or where he was. He was in two places at once. Did he need to be back at base with the team, or out in the freezer room alone? The freezer room for now, he decided.

Steve opened Bucky's eyes and looked around. _Think. Who am I?_

_Let's say that I am Bucky._

_Long before Zola turned me into what I am, he performed experiments on me at the Hydra fortress. I would not have survived the fall without that._

_But Steve destroyed the fortress. It was a hollow shell when we left it._

_So Zola lost the records of that work._

_Not all records, necessarily; he still has me. Whatever he did to me has been recorded in my body, somehow._

Steve/Bucky looked around the room. _They must be failed experiments, or else we would have encountered them by now. Failed experiments that he keeps, frozen, hopeful for the day he can correct his mistakes._

_Now that he has me, he believes he can._

_Why hasn't he used me for that before now?_

_Because Hydra had other uses for me. They didn't want to risk my being destroyed before they could take over the world._

_But the leadership structure of Hydra has been destroyed. Zola is now on his own._

_He can complete the work he started._

_Can he really be placing so much hope upon a biological record of a process that was performed seventy years ago?_

_When you've hoped for something so powerfully for such a long time, it becomes magical, somehow. I am his talisman._

_Now, say that I am Steve. What can I come up with?_

_Steve has friends._

Steve opened his eyes. "I'm trapped in a room full of Zola's failed attempts to create another Winter Soldier. They have me clamped to a metal chair with thick metal cuffs around my arms. I need to get out of here before they perform another mind wipe."

Everybody in the room stared at Steve.

Steve gritted his teeth. "I don't have time to explain. We're melded right now. Just tell me if any of you have any ideas."

Stark said, "You're... Barnes?"

"Let's say that I am. What advice would you give him?"

"Do you have any idea where you are located?" Fury asked.

"No."

"Skip that," Stark said, his eyes suddenly intent. "Is the back of your shoulder pressed against a hard surface?"

Steve blinked. "Yes."

"Slam your shoulder back against it, as hard as you can."

Steve blinked, and became Bucky. He wasn't sure he trusted Stark, but there wasn't time to argue. He leaned forward, and then pushed himself violently back against the seat, banging his shoulder against the hard surface. "Okay, nothing happened."

"Do it again, harder."

Bucky leaned forward and slammed himself backward so hard that his head hit the frame of the seat and his ears rang. This time, he heard a click... and the lower part of his arm exploded.

Steve was immediately shoved back into his own body. He frantically reached back through the link; Bucky was still alive, but dazed. Steve stared at Stark. "What the hell did you do to his arm?"

Stark said, "I just improved it a little. He's lucky, incidentally, that he didn't damage the incendiaries when he cut off his hand." He shrugged at Steve. "Hey, what's the point of having prosthetics if you can't weaponize them?"

"Why didn't you tell him? He could have accidentally blown his own arm off at any time!"

"I didn't tell him because he didn't need to know until now. And no, he couldn't have blown his arm off, not unless the two of you like to slam each other into walls doing fuckerobics." Stark paused. "Do you?"

"Stark, if we manage to get Bucky back alive, I'm going to..."

"Do you know that the two of you are like a one-note song? 'I'll kill you, I'll kill you, well now I'll for SURE kill you...' You can do whatever you like to me, right after you thank me for saving his life. Is he free of the chair yet?"

Steve sat back down and ferociously turned his thoughts to Bucky. _Are you okay?_

_... I'm alive. Blast blew the metal cuff right off the chair and into my face, I think my jaw is broken..._

_Are you free?_

_... my arm ends well above the elbow now..._

Steve infiltrated Bucky's mind again, taking over his thoughts as much as possible since Bucky seemed too stunned to react.

Bucky was still in the chair, but the left arm of it was completely destroyed, as was the console. _No more danger of a mind wipe now,_ Steve thought grimly. The cuff on the other chair arm had apparently been disabled by the explosion, and had lifted free. _Get up._

Bucky tried; his body wouldn't respond.

_Get on your feet, soldier._

Bucky stumbled to his feet. _Am I still armed?_ He patted himself down quickly. _No. Doesn't matter. I'm still a killing machine._

 _A badly damaged killing machine._ He stumbled forward and fell against one of the freezers. He looked inside.

The man in the freezer had no arms or legs, and his eyes had been replaced by small servos. Even in the freezer, they were slowly spinning.

Bucky looked at one of the nearby tables, and noted that one of the metal arms was stained with blood.

_Their bodies couldn't heal like mine; they rejected the prosthetics. That's why he was failing._

Bucky looked back into the freezer, and swallowed.

_Zola, you monster._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apologies everybody who is following this fic; the holiday has caught me off-guard and I haven't written the rest of this yet. Do not despair! We will rescue Bucky ASAP!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So sorry for the delay. Because you waited so long, I'm going to go ahead and post the next three parts.

_"Darling... Sweetie... Love of my life..."_

_"What do you want, Tony?"_

_"What, I can't use pet names?"_

_"You actually can when you're addressing a pet, which I'm not."_

_"Sure thing, boss."_

_"That's better."_

_"Pepper, I need to ask you to do something that you're not going to like."_

_"See? I knew you wanted something."_

_"Cynicism causes wrinkles, you know."_

_"Tony. What. Do you want."_

_"I need you to fire your personal assistant."_

_"Kenneth? What has he done?"_

_"Well, uh... he's... sort of a spy, I think."_

_"A spy?"_

_"Weren't you telling me the other day that he's the only person who knows the combination on your luggage?"_

_"And that makes him a spy?"_

_"No, it makes him a suspect."_

_"Of what is he suspected?"_

_"According to Jarvis, someone accessed some schematics the other day."_

_"Who?"_

_"You."_

_"I would have zero interest in doing that."_

_"I know, hence my suspicions."_

_"Why didn't Jarvis stop him from accessing the files?"_

_"Because they were hard copies."_

_"Tony, you've been killing trees?"_

_"No, sheep. They were on vellum."_

_"Vellum is calf skin."_

_"Okay, okay, I might have killed a couple of trees."_

_"So you think Kenneth... what? Dressed up as me and stole your schematics?"_

_"I'm not sure, but he's definitely wanted for questioning."_

_"He's not even here today."_

_"Oh! Well in that case, never mind."_

_"What is that supposed to mean?"_

_"It means he'll probably be dead in a little while. I'm so sorry. I'll buy you new luggage."_

* * *

Bucky shook his head to clear it. He still felt halfway like Steve. He had been wandering the room for several minutes and had yet to find the entrance; it was difficult to see past the rows and rows of tables and freezers. He was considering hefting himself up on top of one of them when he heard a sound a few feet away. He turned.

On a table a few feet away lay a body, partially obscured by one of the freezers; all Bucky could see was a pair of legs. He approached the table.

It appeared to be one of Zola's experiments; a young man whose torso was riddled with wires and patches of metal. His skin was so pale that Bucky thought he must be dead, until the right hand shuddered against the table, making the same soft noise that Bucky had heard a moment ago.

_Zola must have someone working for him, someone with significant skill. Someone he would trust to be his hands. Someone as insane as he was._

Steve thought, _That man is still alive._

_Yes. If you can call it that._

_Can you do anything to help him?_

Bucky sighed. Of course Steve would ask that. He leaned down and pressed two fingers against the man's neck; a faint pulse throbbed there. _There's one thing I can do._

_Wait--_

Bucky made a hard chopping motion with his hand, deep into the man's throat. There was a slight choke and then a slow, almost-silent rattle as the man's breath stopped. The hand on the table stilled.

_Buck, I didn't mean to kill him._

_Trust me, Steve, that is the only thing I could possibly have done for him._ Bucky looked around the room. _In fact..._

_No, Buck. You don't have the time._

_I don't want to leave them here._

_Worry about that after we've gotten you out of this._

Bucky moved past the next row of freezers and spotted a door a few dozen feet away. He approached it cautiously.

There was a steady beeping sound and some clicking; somebody was typing in there. He flattened himself against the wall, creeping nearer the opening. He hazarded a glance inside; if only he wasn't so _dizzy_.

There was a man sitting at a keyboard, rapidly typing; his back was to the doorway. Bucky peered further into the room... nobody else was there. He slipped inside. His motions weren't perfect, but still silent enough to sneak up behind the man at the computer. Bucky didn't waste time with pleasantries. Inside of a second, he had the man in a half-nelson (with only one arm it was more like a half half-nelson) and had slammed his face into the keyboard. Ignoring the man's screams of pain, Bucky leaned in and hissed in his ear, "Who are you and what is this place?" His speech was slightly slurred because of his hurt jaw, but understandable enough for the present purpose.

"S... Sergeant Barnes," gasped the man.

"That's me. I know who I am. I want to know who _you_ are."

"Kenneth Mitjek. I work... I work for Zola."

The man started to struggle, and Bucky slammed him face-first into the keyboard again. "Be still. What do you do here?"

"Research." The man spat blood. "Trying to... duplicate..."

"Me, I take it?"

"Yes. So far... unsuccessfully."

"Why?"

"Because you had one thing none of the other subjects here had... Zola experimented on you with surges of energy from the tesseract."

_Are you hearing this, Steve?_

_Yes, and passing it on to the others._

"So why keep trying?" Bucky asked, not sure he really wanted to know the answer.

"Because Zola thought we might... reacquire you."

"What good would I do you?"

"Your DNA was altered by the tesseract... we thought... we could duplicate the mutation with modern technology..."

"And in the meantime, why not torture a few people in the name of science?" Bucky tightened his hold on Kenneth's neck. "You learned from the Nazis well."

"Your own modifications wouldn't have been possible without their research."

"Tell me why I shouldn't kill you."

Kenneth spat again, and laughed shortly. "If you want out, you'd better keep me alive. I have the key codes to open the doors."

"Very well." Bucky spun Kenneth around and dropped him on the floor, releasing his hold and aiming a vicious kick at Kenneth's elbow. Kenneth clutched his arm and howled, falling to the floor.

"You've broken my arm!"

"Call it a warning. Any funny business, and I start breaking more parts of you. Where did you put my weapons?"

Kenneth pointed a shaky finger at a cabinet in the corner. Bucky opened it. _Well, well, well._

_What is it?_

_The first good news I've had all day long._ Bucky reacquired several of his guns and knives, and then reached into the bottom of the cabinet, putting out a large round object.

It was Steve's shield.

Bucky glanced at Kenneth, who was still rolling on the floor. "Get up. Time to go."


	10. Chapter 10

_"When they reach the top floor, kill him. Better a dead specimen than none at all."_

_"Yes, sir."_

* * *

"So you're suggesting what?" Steve asked.

"A missile strike," Stark said grimly. "Just as soon as he clears the area."

"Why can't we go back and get him first?"

"Well, let's take this step by step. Romanov is in the hospital. Hill is sick. Fury is still infirm. You're barely in one piece. Wilson's flight gear was damaged on the trip back. It's a terrible idea for Banner to try and go get him, leastwise if we want him back in one piece. And whoever is there knows things about the sensors on my suit that I would really rather not test firsthand. I was probably lucky to get out the first time. I can still take a jet over there and pick him up, but I can't get him out of the building that way without causing enough damage to the building to kill him as well."

"So jet over there. He'll get himself out." Steve rubbed his head. He didn't want to admit to how tired he was. _Bucky is worse off than I am, and he still has to keep moving._ He firmed his jaw. "I can come with you and help."

"How precious. No."

Fury cut in. "What was it you were mumbling about the tesseract a minute ago, Rogers?"

"Apparently the experiments Zola did on Bucky involved energy harnessed from it. That's why he's been unable to duplicate Bucky's abilities in someone else."

"But he still thinks he can."

"With Bucky to work with, and with current technology, yes." Steve closed his eyes. _Buck, how's it going?_

_Best day of my life so far._

_Don't be cute. Stark wants to bomb the entire site._

_Tell him to go ahead._

_Not until you're out._

_I might not make it out. If I don't, if they manage to get me on one of those operating tables again, I want you to tear this place apart._

_Bucky..._

_Steve, I'm never going there again._ Bucky sent Steve a quick few flashes of memory; the experiments, the torture, the modifications, the mind control. _You know better than anybody else what was done to me. Never again._

_You should have thought about that before nobly sacrificing yourself to save me._

_Steve, that is one thing you will never get me to regret._

_Where are you now?_

Bucky sent Steve a flash-image of a white hallway. _We have three more floors to go up and then we're out, if I can believe this guy._

"Who's the stooge he captured?" Stark asked.

_What was his name?_

_Kenneth Mitjek._

"Does the name Kenneth Mitjek sound familiar?"

"Unfortunately yes," Stark said wearily. "He's the spy, alright."

_Evidently he's been working for Stark Industries. How's he connected with Zola?_

_I think Zola is the brains and Kenneth is the hands._

_Zola's been two steps ahead of us this whole time. I'd expect a few nasty surprises before you make it out of there._

_I was thinking the same thing._

An instant later, Steve got a flash image from Bucky of elevator doors opening to reveal a group of thugs, armed to the teeth, some of whom had metal arms and legs.

_Case in point._

_I thought his experiments failed!_

_Evidently a few of them survived._


	11. Chapter 11

_"Jarvis, ready the jet."_

_"Right away sir. I have received a coded transmission from an unknown source, intended for you. Shall I decipher it for you?"_

_"For Chrissakes, please tell me nobody's broken into the mainframe."_

_"No sir, this message wasn't cloaked, it was clearly intended to be intercepted."_

_"What's the message?"_

_"The header says that it concerns the death of your parents, sir."_

* * *

Bucky sized up the cyborg men in an instant. They were powerful, but flimsy; the human parts of them looked sick, the robotic parts looked in bad repair. There was no intelligence whatsoever in their eyes. They could be defeated easily... if he had two good hands. Fortunately the shield was attached to his arm and left his hand free for a gun, but that was really no substitute. It would have to do, though.

They all trained their weapons on him, and Bucky realized that this time, Zola was out to kill. _Sorry, Kenneth_ , he thought as he ducked behind Steve's shield just before a hail of bullets filled the air. Kenneth dropped, dead before he hit the floor.

Bucky charged the cyborgs, shield in front of him. He knocked the first one back into his companions, and the three scrambled to untangle themselves. Bucky shot the first one in the head, and it continued to try to get up... so they were tough. He shot it in the chest, and it charged him, bumping him backward. It was difficult for him to keep his balance with one arm. Bucky sized up the situation and turned and ran. He sent Steve a brief message of what was happening.

_Don't worry, Stark's coming to get you._

Bucky ran through a maze of hallways, intentionally trying to lose himself in the hopes that he would lose his pursuers as well.

"Sergeant Barnes, you have no hope of making it out alive." Zola's voice boomed out of the air; there was an intercom system apparently. "I have notified your friend Tony Stark of your crimes against him, and he comes to kill you just as surely as I do."

Bucky darted into a dark room and hid himself behind a cabinet. _Steve, tell me I just heard wrong._

He got nothing from Steve but utter confusion.

Zola's voice boomed out again. "Of course you wouldn't remember, because you weren't aware of who was in the car when you killed them. You were simply given a date and a location."

Bucky felt himself begin to sweat. _No. Steve?_

He felt Steve quickly running through his memories, that enormous, intimidating database of murder and mayhem that was in Bucky's mind. There was a car accident that Bucky had caused in 1991. It had killed two people, a man and a woman.

_Bucky, no... it's impossible._

_Of course it's possible._

"When you analyze the situation, Sergeant Barnes, can you really justify the fact that you are alive at all? Do you not deserve to die? So surrender yourself."

_Bucky, you didn't know who it was._

_It doesn't matter. If I had known, I would have killed them anyway. And something tells me that Zola just gave Stark all the evidence he needs to show that it was me who killed his parents._

He felt a wave of helpless anger and grief from Steve. Bucky pressed his forehead against the edge of Steve's shield. It smelled like Steve, a little. He wanted to cry.

_Zola's right, you know. All of this work to keep me alive all this time... really, shouldn't I have died long ago? Wouldn't it be right, in a way?_

_Bucky, I honestly don't care._

_Captain America not caring about right and wrong? I've corrupted you by just existing._

_No._

Zola had a tone of false sadness in his voice. "You will be found and you will be killed. Such a waste. With you, I could have created the next race of truly superior soldiers, a legion of supermen. But instead you will die, if not by the hands of my cyborgs, then by the missiles that Stark has sent flying toward this building."

_Bucky, stop listening to him._

"And I will die as well. It is best, perhaps. I will die and the culmination of my great work will die with me."

_Bucky. BUCKY!_

_What?_

_You don't have to die! Keep running, keep fighting!_

_Steve..._

_No, I won't hear anymore, get up!_

_Steve, listen to me._ Bucky felt weariness down to his bones. He realized that he was afraid to die. Afraid because he didn't know where he would end up afteward. _The reckoning has come, and it's time for me to pay the price._

_It wasn't you. It was never you._

_We've already been through this. Please don't make this harder than it already is. I only have a few more seconds to live. Steve... send me a memory. A good one. Something I can take with me. So I don't feel so alone._

He felt a flood of love and longing so intense that it shook him. And then, a quiet memory... hide and seek, when they were kids. Steve was always better at it than Bucky was; he was smaller, could hide more places, and he was quieter. At least he had been, once upon a time. Now Bucky was the quiet, stealthy one. Inhumanly quiet and stealthy. In fact, it almost seemed as though Bucky melted into the scenery at times, as though he could vanish and reappear at will. It almost seemed...

_I was infused with energy from the tesseract._

"Goodbye, my child."

Bucky closed his eyes, opened his mind, and focused upon one thing, one thought, the feeling he'd had back in Zola's room. _If I can make it back to you, if there is any mercy in the universe fit to see a monster like me turn into a human being and love someone else more than the entire world, then I will come back._

Bucky took a deep breath, and reached out... he didn't know for what... something inside of himself, deep in his flesh and bones, something beyond his power to kill and hurt... something else. Another kind of power. Slowly, a blue glowing light began to form around the edges of his vision.

He could hear the missiles screaming through the sky an instant before everything exploded, and he bore down, and

_falling_

Bucky opened his eyes and dropped the shield with a clatter on the ground. He found himself looking at the one person in the world he would have done anything to be able to see again. "Steve?"

Steve's face was white as a sheet. "Where did you... how? Bucky, what did you..."

"It was a miracle," Bucky said, and then everything turned gray, and he passed out.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Whew, finally! But there will be more.


	12. Chapter 12

_"Sir, the target has been destroyed."_

_"I need confirmation that the crater goes at least a hundred feet down."_

_"Confirmed."_

_"Scan the debris for life signs."_

_"None found."_

_"Good."_

* * *

Nobody was sure if what Zola had said could be believed, so nobody was sure whether Bucky needed to be protected from Stark. To be safe, Fury immediately moved them to a different location and brought in some more medics for Bucky and Steve. No hospitals. Fortunately, Bucky's jaw had only been dislocated, so it was an easy (if painful) fix and no surgery necessary.

Steve was grateful that they had decided not to take either of them to a hospital. In a hospital, there would have been an army of nurses keeping him separate from Bucky until each of them was treated, but the three medics here were hardly a match for Steve. He managed to hover over Bucky like a protective hen, regardless of what was being done to either of them.

When Steve and Bucky had enough of medical treatment, they shooed and bullied the medics away, and finally...

Steve tangled his fingers in Bucky's hair and pressed their foreheads together, breathing in deeply. "Buck." They were both shirtless and wrapped in bandages; Steve pressed his chest into Bucky's, disregarding the pain.

"I made it back," Bucky murmured.

Steve clenched his hands into fists, pulling Bucky's hair. "Why would you do that to me?"

Bucky smiled gingerly. "You sure you want to start a fight right now?"

"No," sighed Steve. "I just want to be sure you're really here."

"How could we make sure of that?"

"Make some room." Steve climbed into the small medical cot next to Bucky, and slung a leg over Bucky's hip. They held each other. Steve gently touched the burnt and frayed wires emerging from where Bucky's arm had been. "Stark is the only living person I know of who could reconstruct this."

"Then something tells me I'm going to be armless for a while. Not such a bad thing, really. At least this way I know I don't have any bombs planted on me."

"That bastard," whispered Steve.

"Come closer," said Bucky.

Kissing was an impossibility with Bucky's jaw in such bad shape; anything beyond it would have quickly stalled given what lousy physical condition they were both in. Steve contented himself with stroking Bucky's hair and kissing his face and neck gently. They traded memories back and forth, childhood days, the endless years that they were apart, their reunion. Bucky mischievously began to remember intense sessions of sex until Steve groaned and begged him to stop.

They eventually settled into an uneasy sleep.

Steve woke up feeling strangely warm. He could sense that Bucky was awake already, and concentrating deeply on something. Steve opened his eyes. Bucky's body was faintly limned in a blue glow.

_What are you doing?_

_Experimenting._

_Stop. I don't want you to disappear._

_I won't disappear. I'm actually not even sure I could... I think teleporting here was like one of those feats of strength people have in desperate situations. Like the mom who lifted a car off her kid. Not something I could just do because I wanted to._

"Bucky, stop it. I don't know if you realize it, but you are _blue_."

"Am I?" The glow suddenly dissipated. "Sorry." Bucky yawned, touching his jaw as it stretched. He seemed to be able to speak without pain now.

"What were you trying to do?"

"I'm not sure. It's sort of like flexing a muscle you didn't know you had. I'm seeing what happens when I do, well... this." The faint haze of blue returned and then flickered out.

"Is it blue because of the tesseract? I remember those power cells at the fortress, they were blue."

"I think so."

"What could the tesseract do, other than teleport people?"

"I honestly have no idea."

"We should ask Thor."

"Who?"

"Um... long story."

Bucky closed his eyes and glowed again. It lasted slightly longer this time. Steve could feel the effort of concentration Bucky was putting into it.

"Is that difficult?"

"Very. I was laying here practicing for about an hour before you woke up."

Steve checked the softly beeping monitor in the corner; it was 9am. They'd slept over twelve hours. His body felt remarkably refreshed, almost back to its regular self. He unwrapped the bandages from his chest; the bruising was nearly gone. "How do you feel?"

"Like a million bucks. Well." Bucky indicated his missing arm. "Maybe like half a million bucks. You look better."

"Thanks," Steve said drily. "We could both probably use a bath."

"I look forward to that."

"I think we can table that proposition for a little while." Fury stepped into the room. "Feeling better, I take it?"

"We live to fight another day," said Steve. "Any word from Stark?"

"A few words, in fact. Maybe not the ones you were expecting."

Steve and Bucky exchanged a look. Steve said, "Time for a discussion, then."


	13. Chapter 13

_"Apparently they're both okay. Barnes is minus an arm, though."_

_"Stark will have to fix that."_

_"Um, about that..."_

_"Oh, no. He found out?"_

_"How did you know?"_

_"Bruce, it wasn't that hard to put together. Barnes would have been the perfect man for the job. And I know how much guilt he's carrying."_

_"Natasha, I thought your involvement in his personal problems was over."_

_"That doesn't mean the problems have gone away completely."_

_"Enough about that. They'll have to work it out on their own. How's your shoulder?"_

_"It hurts. I wish they'd occasionally shoot me in the other shoulder now and then, this one is getting pretty beat up."_

* * *

Stark's face on the monitor was pale, nearly grayish. He looked as though he hadn't rested.

Bucky cleared his throat. "Okay. I'm here."

"I have one question for you," Stark said, in a voice that was as colorless as his face.

"Go for it."

"Did you or did you not tell Steve that you would rather die than be captured?"

It wasn't the question Bucky was expecting to hear at all. He blinked for a moment. "Um. Yes, actually, I told him exactly that."

"Well, then. I had no way to get you out from the jet, and you weren't going to make it on your own. I was in airspace over the site, waiting for you."

"You didn't come in because they had compromised your suit," Bucky said softly.

Stark let the silence stretch out for a moment. When he spoke again, it was quiet and deadly. "Fuck the suit. I'm not in the habit of leaving my friends behind."

"You didn't come in because of what you found out about me."

"I didn't feel a pressing need to sacrifice myself on your behalf," Stark said.

Bucky opened his mouth, and then shut it again, swallowing around a hard lump in his throat. He felt slightly numb and dizzy. Here it was, what he had dreaded for months: having to face one of the people he had harmed. He tried again, and managed to whisper, "I didn't know who they were."

"That wouldn't have mattered to you at the time," Stark said coldly.

Bucky shook his head. They both knew it was true.

_Let me talk to him._

_No, Steve. You need to stay out of this._

"I could have killed you," Stark said. "I don't think I would have felt a thing."

"You did kill me," Bucky said. "For all you knew."

"No. I didn't."

"You didn't fire the missiles?"

"No," Stark whispered. "I came close. I nearly did."

Bucky stared, dumbfounded.

"But I didn't do it. Whoever blew up the facility did it from the inside. All I did was watch. I have to admit I hoped that you were in there."

"But... why would they do that?"

"You tell me."

"Zola was..." Bucky stopped, trying to breath evenly. "I damaged him. Maybe he went insane. He was talking to me, near the end. He wasn't making much sense."

"I heard some of it," Stark said shortly. "He called you his child."

"He thought he created me."

Stark tilted his head. "It's really a moral dilemma, isn't it? If he created you, then you're not responsible for the things you did. But if he created you, then you are purely evil, because that was what he wanted to create. If some part of you is still the same person you were before he changed you, then you're not purely evil, but if you're not purely evil, then how could you not stop yourself from... from killing hundreds of people?"

A tear slid down Bucky's face. "He didn't create me."

"Then you should have been able to stop it."

"I should have been, yes."

"Okay, enough," Steve said.

"You speaking for him again?" Stark said.

"Why not?" Steve demanded. "I'm the only other person here who was inside his head while it was happening. If Bucky won't defend himself, I will."

"Fine. Defend him," said Stark.

Steve put a hand on Bucky's shoulder and looked up at the screen. "He tried to stop it. He hated what he was doing. He hated himself. I felt that, for years. Some part of Bucky... some part that they nearly destroyed, by erasing his mind over and over and over again... some part of him tried. Zola had him for decades, and never stopped manipulating his brain. He couldn't stop, because all the time, Bucky was finding new ways to fight him."

"Begging your pardon, but weren't you frozen during most of that time?"

"I've read his memories. _All_ of them. By the time I was unfrozen, he had nearly given up. He was dying. Mostly because he was trying to. He couldn't kill himself, but he could will himself to die. You saw him, when we first found him... he was deteriorating."

Stark gave a short, reluctant nod.

"He started deteriorating again when his memories resurfaced. For some time, he wanted to die again."

"I did," whispered Bucky.

"Like you do now," Steve said sharply.

Bucky hung his head. Steve was right; all Bucky could feel around him was darkness. Death seemed the only logical result of what he had done. Not even a punishment; punishment was not the right word. _Result._ The inevitable, undeniable result.

"I'll tell you something else. Zola didn't create you. And he knew it. You proved it to him at the end, and he tried to destroy you for it." Steve turned to Stark. "Isn't the fact that Zola wanted him dead a mark in his favor? At the end of everything, Bucky proved himself to be something other than what Zola tried to turn him into. Something other than what we've all been trying to use him as."

"So what is he, then?" Stark asked quietly.

"None of us know, because we've all had our purposes for him. You wanted him as a weapon," he said to Stark. "Fury wanted him for a database. We all wanted him to kill Hydra operatives."

"Not you," Bucky said. "You wanted to stop them. And me."

Steve stopped, seemingly unsure.

Bucky turned to Stark. "If you wanted to kill me, it would be your right."

"I don't want to kill you," Stark said, hoarsely. "I want my parents back."

"And I want my life back," said Bucky. "But neither of us are going to get what we want, are we?" He paused. "One thing I can give you: your parents were good, powerful, determined people. Hydra would never have wanted them dead otherwise."

Stark nodded. "They were."

"So were mine," Bucky said softly. "My dad never told a lie in his life. My mom never let a beggar go hungry. I went off to war, and I never saw them again. They died while I was locked in a box. Or maybe they died on a day that I was out killing people."

"It's not the same thing," Stark said.

"I didn't say it was," Bucky said. "I just miss them." Another tear slid down his cheek.

There was a heavy silence.

Steve looked at Stark and said, "Bucky isn't the only person in this group responsible for hundreds of deaths."

Stark cleared his throat. "The site... Zola... is destroyed, completely."

"Are you sure?" Fury said.

"Absolutely. After the first explosion, I fired my missiles."

"Just in case I survived?" Bucky said lightly.

"Just in case," Stark said agreeably.

Bucky gave Steve a sharp mental nudge; Steve shut his mouth, fuming. Bucky looked up at the screen and indicated his arm. "I don't suppose I can ask you for a new arm?"

"I'm surprised you would trust me to do that."

"Why shouldn't I trust you? You saved my life in there," Bucky said. He gave Steve another nudge. _Stop it. He's coming around._

"Give me a few days to think about it."

"Done."

The screen went dark. Stark was gone.

Fury said, "Well done, Barnes."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Soooo close to being finished! One more chapter should do it.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please note that the rating on this fic has been changed to Explicit.

_"You're not actually going to do it, are you?"_

_"I am."_

_"You don't owe him anything, Tony."_

_"I know that. I'm not doing it for him. Or for Rogers. Or any of them."_

_"Then for who?"_

_"For_ whom _."_

_"Tony, I am the CEO of Stark Industries, I can certainly figure out how to kill a man and hide the body where nobody will ever find it."_

_"But you'd miss me."_

_"Probably._ Whom _are you doing this for?"_

_"Maybe I'm doing it for my dad."_

_"How's that?"_

_"He would have done it if he were here."_

_"He's not here."_

_"No, he's not. I am. So it had better be me."_

* * *

Bucky refused to let Stark use anything more than a topical anesthetic while Stark worked on his arm. He also refused to let Steve watch, which made Steve suspect the worst; that some kind of exchange of torture for wrongdoing was taking place... but Steve knew better than to interfere. This was between Stark and Bucky. And when Bucky returned from the operation, he looked no worse than strained and tired, so Steve let what happened between those two remain unspoken and unprobed.

They inaugurated Bucky's new arm in their own way.

They lay in bed, naked, while Bucky slid his metal hand slowly up and down Steve's chest and belly. Then across his flank, and down his thigh, so incredibly slowly... slowly because he wanted to be careful, he wasn't sure with this hand yet. He didn't trust it yet. But Stark had done excellent work. Bucky's stroking hand was smooth and steady, his touch light yet firm.

He continued to touch Steve (with both hands, after a while) until Steve was sighing, and then panting, and finally begging. Then Bucky carefully (so carefully) ran a single metal fingertip up the underside of Steve's cock.

_Please, Buck..._

_Hush. You're in good hands._

Bucky explored Steve with his new hand, touching him outside and inside, stroking, rubbing, massaging, probing. Every part of Steve felt new under this new touch. Bucky followed the progress of his hand with his mouth, and finally used them both at the same time until Steve was crying his name out and arching off the bed, coming hard, unable to stop until Bucky allowed him to.

Bucky let him sleep for two hours, and then began everything again...

They ended up making love four times, well into the next day, before Bucky finally was satisfied that his arm was as good or better than the old one. _Better_ , Steve affirmed.

_Are you sure it's better? Maybe I should try one more time._

_You're going to kill me if we keep this up... you have to sleep too, you know._

_How can I sleep when I have you in my bed? Way too tempting._

_How can I sleep when I know you might have a bomb in your new arm?_

_I don't._

_Wait..._

_Yes, that's why I asked him to keep me awake. I wanted to be armed. Not armed._

_That's excruciatingly unfunny._

_Then why are you smiling?_

_I've just had four orgasms, my mouth doesn't even work properly anymore._

_You do look kind of silly and vague right now._

_Get over here._

_Hey... watch the arm!_

Later, Steve watched Bucky sleep. Occasionally he thought he could catch a faint blue glow hovering over Bucky's skin. He supposed that would probably have to be dealt with, sooner or later.

He decided to worry about it some other time.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> YAYYYYYYYY!!!
> 
> That may have been one of the sillier things I have ever written. Seriously. The action got ENTIRELY out of hand there. It was loads of fun, though, and I hope it was as fun to read as it was to write.


End file.
